Sunday, October 31, 2004

worked out

To get on-track with this exercise program, I've enlisted the aid of my daughter and fitlinxx.

My daugher got me to the gym on Saturday. She went to her first live yoga class. She's been working out with a tape for a couple of months. Anyway -- back to me!!!

I went reluctantly but as promised without complaining. I had the desk person show me the secret "for special people only" locker room. I upgraded our family membership so I could get into said locker room. It has the sauna, the whirlpool, and baskets to leave lotion and other small things in. Okay - what about the workout? It was not as interesting as the sauna instructions. but ...

I didn't want to see people so I aimless walked around to different floors. Put my heartrate monitor on (I love that thing. It's one of the best gifts I've ever received). I got on a stairclimber that was in a hall. Did that for about 8 minutes. I hate stairclimbers. I looked into the 30 minute express workout room (a Curves knockoff). There were two many (2) people in there so I wandered some more. Decided to bite the bullet and go to the big, too bright, main workout space. I saw the cross trainers and remembered that I usually like them. Saw some new ones (lifefitness 95xi). Got on and enjoyed it as much as I can enjoy working out. Kept thinking, "this is sort of relaxing, wish I had something to read or listen to." Kept writing myself notes on the index cards I'd brought with me. I had a headache and was planning to just sit somewhere. I Kept going to fast. I told it I wanted to do the fat burning program so I was supposed to keep my heartrate around 117 but I averaged 139. Burned 250 calories!!

My daughter's yoga class was an hour. So I must have wandered for 30 minutes and worked out for about 38. When I got back to the yoga studio they were finishing up. She really enjoyed it.

Today - I went to fitlinxx.com and signed up for help. They know when I workout because I log it at the gym. Now if I don't workout they'll email me!! That's the most exciting, useful, motivating thing I could have done. The program I signed up for - First Traxx - asked me questions about my goals and my challenges and introduced me to the concept of a PAP - Positive Action Plan. PAP is not the best acronym they could have used. But ... anything else of interest? oh, I made my "white level fit points goal" the last time I was at the gym (12 Oct) - the points were from 2 years ago except for the last few that got me over. What does this mean? (1) I get a free water bottle (2) I don't have the past hanging around. White level behind me - on to yellow. (3) I need to accumulate 15,000 points. (4) I must be tired because I'm rambling - off to bed

Friday, October 15, 2004

Dry Skin

Problem –
My skin hurts. My skin is dry year round but it especially hurts this time of year when the air is so dry. My hands especially suffer. The nails are short and bitten. The cuticles are ravished and spiky. I wash my hands too often. But alternative #1- not washing - wakes up my germ paranoia, alternative #2 – using hand sanitizer (thickened alcohol) – is as bad as washing. So fall rolls around and my skin dries up and starts to hurt.
Interventions –
Past -
I’ve tried all kinds of things to remedy my dry skin.

  • I’ve read about dry skin.
  • I’ve had humidifiers.
  • I’ve greased myself in oil - baby, sesame, olive, blends.

For a moment, the interventions all seem to work.
Then my skin gobbles up the moisture and goes back to hurting.
What haven’t I tried? Please post suggestions below.
Present -
I drink my water. I try not to take hot baths even though that’s how I like them.
We don’t have a shower so it’s seldom that I indulge in that luxury. I have bottles of lotion everywhere - in the car, at school, multiple places in the house, my purse (these need a refill).
I’ve taken to buying expensive lotion – Nivea is the latest experiment.
Six plus dollars for lotion is totally against my attempts at money management - but that’s another rant.

Cosmic confusion -

I was born in the fall so I’ve always thought that my body should be attuned to this weather. But the season doesn’t love me. Should it? Was I born at the wrong time?
I have often felt out of place, out of time, out of this body. Is dry skin just one more indication that I am right about my temporal displacement? That topic seems best left as fodder for fiction.
Solution? –
I’m going to do a systematic observation – keep a log – run a real experiment.
Will I? Will I really let my dry skin add another project to my already over extended project list? I should not have let that idea into my psychological world. Now, according to my productivity biblio-mentor, David Allen, I have to deal with it. Is this another ploy by my body to capture and hold my attention?

Sunday, October 03, 2004

baby step?

signed self and family up at the YMCA

discipline, control,

If I can't/won't/don't discipline/control my body how can I realistically expect other aspects of my life to be as I want them? Flow is a fiction, an excuse to be passive. I know this. I know I am reactive. I want to be proactive but my habitual way of being is reactive. For as long as I can remember, instead of making things happen I waited and reacted to what happened. It started as a defense? Defense is not the right word.

childhood. I hate the thought of therapies that start with the distant past yet I can see/sense/acknowledge that the roots of a thing must be healed if the thing (in this case, my self-discipline ?)is to experience growth. Did I say what I mean?

Maybe being reactive is my natural state. Is it wrong/right/okay to alter something's natural state. I repeat; Flow is a fiction. I don't always believe this. So maybe flow is sometimes a fiction.

childhood. This is where the body came into play. Female, Brown, working class, braided hair/pressed hair, book in hand, girl clothes, -- don't call attention to yourself, act right, don't be loud, sit still, act like a child, don't be smart mouthed, mind adults, don't sit like that, stop acting like a boy, little girls don't....

How to erase it all? Can it/ should it be erased? What would happen if it were erased? It'll have to be a spring board. But that's being reactive. Maybe not.

Why do I think I want to be "proactive"? Why do I want to be "proactive"? Is this the same question?

starting as best I can

I will begin at the beginning and follow my thoughts, urgings, readings, writings, intuition, and as yet unknown proddings.

I have often referred to the body as a ‘spirit container’. I have heard other people use similar analogies. My body places me in this world. My body is a marker. What is it holding a place for?

In linguistics, according to D, a marker is (a) an element of a construction, as a coordinating conjunction, which is not a part of either immediate constituent and (b) a constituent that determines the function of a construction. This linguistics “marker” is interesting but different from my place holding marker. Isn’t it? How often will language in various forms try to blow me off course?

If I, in this brown, female, plump body, were born in a different place and/or time, I’d experience this world differently and this world would experience me differently. If I were born in the exact same place and time, but in a different physical form, I’d experience this world differently. So, the way I am is relevant to this experience.

There is no way to test this theory.

Sometimes, I try to forget/ignore how important the body is to being in this world. Sometimes, I try to pretend as if the body doesn’t count. Sometimes I forget how much of who I am has to do with the body I live in.

There is that disembodied thought, “I” separated from “body”. That is what I want to consciously explore in some structured way.